Teaching preschoolers letter and word recognition is easy and fun with creative materials like these Rock Letters. Rock Letters are perfect for a dinosaur theme but really, they can be left out all year round or even used outdoors. I love adding natural items to my environment and children just love rocks.
Rock Letters
Supplies Needed:
- 26 small rocks (or more if you are making upper and lower case letters)
- Oil Based Sharpie Marker in black or white (White Out will also work)
Write each letter of the alphabet on the rocks. Really shake your oil-based Sharpie marker to get it started and writing smoothly. You may want to press down the tip on a paper towel briefly to get the ink flowing.
I chose river rocks that are various shades of color but you can also find black or white rocks. Choose a white or black oil-based paint marker to write on your rocks. For each letter, I tried to find a rock that sort of matched the shape of the letter. It makes them look interesting!
The oil-based paint marker does not rub off. It may wear off later but if so you can just write over the letters again.
I started out with just the upper case letters but I will be making another set of lower case. It also helps to have more than one letter if you’re trying to spell words like “away” that has two letter A’s.
My group has mostly enjoyed playing with the rocks as loose parts materials during play but we also used them Mother Goose Time “I Can Read” books. Our book this month is called Dinosaurs Go Away.
The I Can Read books are wonderful for developing literacy skills! Each book comes with word cards and pointers for a few focus words each month.
Spelling “big” and “go”.
Use the pointers to find the word on each page.
We are beginning to read!
Our letter rocks are a well-used resource in our room. Make some for your classroom!